I am your typical housewife living in high maintenance suburbia. I have a handsome husband, 2 kids and a flock of pet chickens. I try and feed my family with $100 a month. With the help of coupons, gardening and bartering I am able to squeeze the most out of our grocery budget and still manage to have a little fun along the way.

Gardening in New England – Pruning Trees, Stacking Wood and a Little Something for the Mantel

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A few days ago wood guy delivered another cord of firewood. That means if we were to burn every piece of wood we have this winter, we will have gone through 5.5 cords of wood. Yikes!

Yesterday my husband emptied out the woodshed and brought all the seasoned wood that was in there {about 3/4th of a cord} and stacked it up in the garage. I kinda don’t think you are suppose to stack wood in your garage… but what do I know? Anyway, now he’s working on getting all the wood that was delivered the other day into the woodshed so it can dry out {because seriously, we don’t want to buy anymore tarps to cover wood than we need too}.

The wood guy seems to think we’ll have plenty of firewood to get us though the season, and at this point, so does the HH. I’m still not totally convinced though and I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. According to the wood guy, last winter was brutal and the coldest he’s experienced in the 40+ years he’s lived in the area.

Since the first of October, we’ve gone through about 1/4th of a tank of oil {I think our tank holds 275 gallons}. As far as I know, the only thing we use oil for other than heat {we have the thermostat at 60 degrees} is the hot water heater. So basically, we’ve used about $200 in oil over the past 2 months from the heat kicking on upstairs. I don’t think that’s too bad. Do you? {I could go 55 upstairs but the HH said NO!}.

Whatever. I’m just happy to sit inside where it’s nice and warm and be able to look out my window and see the snow on the ground and know that I don’t have to go anywhere if I don’t want to. It’s the best of both worlds right now, and I am soaking it all in. Summer and all the chores that come with it will be here soon enough, right now…. all I want to do is recharge my batteries, if you know what I mean.

A strawberry popcorn buffet left for the chipmunks on the front porch.

Ethel on the hunt.

I figure if I prune 3 trees a week I’ll have them all done by the end of February. 😉

The pond behind our house. Oh how I wish it was a skating pond.

And last but not least…. A little holly and bittersweet for the mantel.

Sounds like the next project for HH is a woodshed! It’s advised that you not store wood in your garage or up against your house as any wood borers, termites etc. will move into the wood in your house. Uninvited guests.

Jana, that is very low usage, particularly in Western New York. Here is Western Mass. the rule of thumb is 1 full cord of wood per room heated, and if it is an extremely cold winter you could easily double that. 🙂

We have a covered porch that we stack wood for when it is below zero or a heavy snow storm /freezing rain. Easier to grab wood from there. The rest of the wood is in a three sided woodshed. It is hard to know how much wood that you will need. So much depends on the house and the temps.

We used to have our hot water from our oil furnace. We realized that we were using a lot of oil to heat the water. We changed to an electric hot water heater. Our oil bill went down and the electric bill stayed the same. It was a winning situation for us. We were using about a gallon of oil a day to heat the water. The best way to judge that is in the summer when the heat is off but hot water is still heating from the oil.

In Jan 1971 my husband and I were relocated to Brunswick Maine from Virginia. I had never lived in snow before. Our apartment was on the top floor of an old house. I woke up one morning and opened the curtain, snow was up to within an inch of the top of the window. I thought we were snowed in, which is almost true. The wind had blown against that side of the house all night long. It was a relief to see we were not engulfed in snow. We still had to dig our way out of the house. After the almost 3 years we were stationed there, I got used to it snowing in September and still on the ground in May. All I really remember is layer upon layer of coats and scarfs, So many blankets on the bed you could hardly move. I remember walking the one block to the end of the lane to catch the bus to work, you could not see the houses for all the snow piled up in front of them. Good luck this winter. (glad to be living in the South West cold but not that cold)

Someone gave us (free of charge) and old outdoor storage box they were just going to toss out. It’s a big Rubbermaid box with lids on the top. It doesn’t look pretty but we have it on our porch with our wood in it and it’s so handy! Keeps the wood dry and holds enough wood for a week or two so we aren’t running back and forth.

Might have already been discussed, but be careful with bittersweet and holly in the house. Not that Lucy will be climbing up on the mantle, lol, but if it starts to dry out and fall off onto the floor you don’t want her eating that.
I believe both are poisonous. I am overly cautious with my two dogs just like I was when my children were small,
I research every plant before having it inside or on property.

We keep wood in the garage – on the concrete, not stacked on the wall–and have never had a problem. You’ll go through the wood your HH stacked there fairly quickly. When you make a new pile stack away from the walls, BTW, your hubby stacks wood very well- nice and tight.

No idea about the wood but you will want to ask your local extension about pruning trees in the winter before you do so. Here, we definitely freeze and the deciduous trees go dormant. Pruning them triggers a growth hormone that wakes them up and causes new growth, which can kill the plant if it’s still freezing temperatures outside. I just found this out myself from a friend who is a Master Gardener – I’ve lived here for almost 20 years! No wonder I’ve lost a few trees along the way!

One of our first orders of business when we bought our 1780 farm house was to take the hot water heater off the heating system. I hated burning oil in the summer just to keep water hot. We installed an electric hot water heater. Be cautioned, however, not to turn off your oil furnace all together in the summer (as my plumber had suggested). Having it run sometimes keeps water moving through the system and avoids rusting and other potential issues. (The latter advice came from the guy that cleans and services my oil burner so I put my confidence in his recommendation.) Even keeping the house at 58 degrees, we still burn 6 cords of hard wood. Welcome to the north east!

I stack my wood in my garage, I haven’t had any issues. My garage is detached from the house, so it seems the perfect spot. The previous homeowners used to stack against the outside wall of the garage and cover with a tarp….I don’t understand that at all! Maybe they had the garage full of stuff. I can keep about 2 cords in there at a time, along with my car….when it gets low I just call the wood guy to deliver more.

I keep the heat at 60 also and went through about 3 cords last season, and it was a long, cold winter! In a previous home I went through 6 – 7 cords in a winter, but the windows were drafty and the woodstove not nearly as efficient as mine.

How do you like the new wood stove?
We are thinking of replacing ours with an wood stove insert. After talking to three sellers/installers we learned that people are idiots. Our 30ish year old Lopi had the baffle pulled out and this is why it doesn’t heat our home well. We are working on figuring out the model number to see if we can get a replacement baffle. I don’t know a whole lot about stoves but c’mon people – ripping a piece of something out is never a good idea! Shesh!